Calgary set to allow wood buildings to reach six storeys

City planners hope to bring on more mid-rise condo projects at lower prices by announcing rules Wednesday to permit six-storey buildings with wood frames. It’s a move the building industry expects to shave 10 per cent off development costs, to make going slightly taller more affordable in some areas.

Jason Markusoff, Calgary Herald

Updated: October 29, 2014

Sole Condos, by Edgecombe Builders in Kelowna, B.C., is a six-storey building with four floors of residential over parking, retail and professional offices.

City planners hope to bring on more mid-rise condo projects at lower prices by announcing rules Wednesday to permit six-storey buildings with wood frames.

It’s a move the building industry expects to shave 10 per cent off development costs, to make going slightly taller more affordable in some areas.

If developers have wanted to build above four floors, long-standing building codes have declared concrete or steel the only safe and structurally sound options. But with the national code about to change and some provinces already allowing wood mid-rises, Calgary will begin accepting permits for five- or six-storey buildings with the cheaper and more environmentally friendly material.

Stronger wood beams and fire safety advances such as active sprinklers during the construction stage have given planning officials confidence there’s no problem with the reform, which British Columbia adopted in 2009. Quebec allows them as well, and Ontario will as of January.

“Once it’s built, there’s no difference between four-storey and six-storey,” said Marco Civitarese, the city’s chief building inspector said. “You have the fire protection systems that a concrete building has.”

The city shouldn’t expect a massive rush of developers looking to build six-storey apartment blocks, but some companies may consider boosting their four-storey projects up a couple floors where height limits allow, said Amie Blanchette of the Canadian Home Builders Association’s Calgary branch.

Because of the cost difference between wood construction and concrete, there’s been limited interest in building six-storey residential projects in Calgary — only six permits have been given out since 2009, according to city statistics.

Bucci Developments is building six levels in concrete on 10th Street N.W. in Kensington, but only because that’s a “premier” location where it makes economic sense, Mike Bucci said.

“It’s probably the most expensive residential building you can build,” said Bucci, the company’s development vice-president.

The Vancouver-based builder also built condos just off Mission’s 4th Street S.W. a few years ago, building the tallest it could with a wood frame.

The zoning let us go to five storeys but it would have been concrete. We said it’s just not worth it, we’ll stick with going up to four.”

If a builder is going to use concrete, it only becomes economical by building much higher structures at eight or 10 storeys, said Rollin Stanley, the city’s chief planner. He’s been trying to enact the six-floor reform every since he joined the City of Calgary two years ago, after years of approving taller wood buildings in the United States.

He’s spoken with several developers who want to go with this middle-density option, rather than low-rises or towers.

“They build out of wood, so they’re ecstatic about these kinds of changes,” Stanley said.

In British Columbia, 79 mid-rises have been built since 2009 in that province, and more than 200 more are in the works, according to the Alberta Forest Products Association, which wants a bigger piece of the condominium business.

“Being able to get our product into that market is huge for us,” group spokesman Brock Milligan said. The lumber industry suggests cost savings can reach up to 20 per cent below concrete construction.

Calgary home builders and city officials toured some Vancouver-area mid-rise projects last month to get a sense of the technical challenges of higher wood structures.

Bucci said if you walked through one, you’d notice a lot more metal fasteners and cables than in a wood low-rise. Framers, engineers and other experts must work more closely together to plan these, Blanchette said.

“It’s not as easy as putting two more floors on top of four,” she said.

The new choice for builders will be tempered by zoning rules that prohibit buildings above four storeys in many parts of Calgary.

The city is reviewing limits on many arteries and key corridors to potentially encourage more of that density type, Stanley said.

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